


An Uphill Battle

by lskello



Series: Pippin & Boromir - Fellowship Ficlets [2]
Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Canon Compliant, Caradhras, Dudes proving their masculinity, Ficlet, Gen, The Ring Goes South, These hobbits are not made for snow, men of gondor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-12 04:15:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29004336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lskello/pseuds/lskello
Summary: The Fellowship attempts to climb Caradhras as it decimates them with a terrible blizzard. The hobbits aren't faring too well, least of all Pippin Took.
Relationships: Boromir (Son of Denethor II) & Pippin Took, Merry Brandybuck & Pippin Took
Series: Pippin & Boromir - Fellowship Ficlets [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2127819
Kudos: 17





	An Uphill Battle

Pippin Took had never seen snow. When it began to fall on the mountain path, he’d cried out in joy and gawked upwards with Merry at the white flakes dancing. Most hobbits hadn’t experienced snow before, except those few of some bizarre nature who’d been taken by a fancy to travel, or those who claimed to be old enough to remember the frozen rivers of the Fell Winter, over a hundred years before. Now, Pippin, Merry, Frodo and Sam were part of that select few.

However, in the stories and drawings he’d seen in The Shire, Pippin didn’t expect snow to be like _this_. He expected almost something like fluffy cotton, coating everything with a cold yet pleasant blanket.

And it was, for approximately four minutes. At first it wafted down in fluffy specks, slow as sifted flour…

Then suddenly it was everywhere, flooding down until Pippin and the rest of the Fellowship could barely see three feet in front of them. The flakes swirled and howled until they became a wall of white-gray smoke that made him feel as if he was suffocating. The air was dense with its chill. It bored right through their fur-lined cloaks from Rivendell and under theirclothes until their bare skin stung. And of course, the hobbits’ feet trudged directly through it, falling several inches into the icy powder with each step they took.

“Now I’m starting to understand shoes,” Pippin grumbled under his breath.

“I can’t feel my feet, and I’m beginning to think that’s quite a good thing,” Merry added. With clumsy mittened hands, he hitched up his pack and checked that the small bundle of wood Boromir made them take was still tied on.

The wind was wailing so noisily that Pippin could barely hear Merry, much less Sam and Frodo shuffling slowly in front of them.He could make out the wizard’s pointed bobbing hat at the front every now and again, and tried to think that as long as Gandalf was with them, they would make it over the pass. A aggravating, bitter old man, Pippin thought, but powerful all the same.

For now he focused on merely taking one step at a time. The snow clung to the bottom of his pants leg like moss, and he’d long since stopped trying to shake it off. Just lifting a foot, stepping forward, and trying not to think of the enormous hobbit-high fires they were probably burning back in the smials of Tuckborough…

“Merry!” Pippin yelped loudly. “Help! I can’t feel my feet either.”

Merry pulled Pippin closer and hooked their arms together, so that they trudged side-by-side up the narrow path. It did little for warmth, but they thought they may yet make it up the mountain.

***

Boromir let his mind fly off as they trudged along. He relied only on his bodily instincts: place this foot there, push forward, scan for threats. It was something he learned to do on the long journey to Rivendell when he thought he could hardly stand another minute of travel. Every endless day on the road led to new mental practices to pass the time. Sometimes he was almost meditative, thinking nothing but sensing everything around him.

This time, though, he had to nearly force himself to get there. The idea of mounting Caradhras seemed so foolish that angry thoughts kept circling in his head. How could Aragorn choose this? Don’t they see that this storm won’t merely let up? The blizzard would kill them all sooner than any measly pack of birds. Why was this godforsaken ranger not able to see reason? After letting these thoughts simmer Boromir had willed himself to abandon them and keep going forward, accepting that he’d agreed to be led.

He was walking second-to-last, just in front of Legolas, when he heard the loud voice of Pippin Took pierce the fog. The hobbits were sandwiched somewhere in the middle of the group alongside Bill the Pony. Boromir’s mind was yanked back by the cry. He sensed the cold again in his cheeks and fingertips.

During their journey through the empty hills of Hollin, Boromir had taken a liking to the hobbits, especially young Pippin and Merry. By the time they’d been on the road a few days, Pippin was talking to him like he'd known him all his life. Merry soon followed his lead. Their chipper spirits made Boromir feel protective over the two younger halflings. Sam and Frodo seemed old enough to take care of themselves, he thought, and anyways they often sought out time alone. Boromir noticed that they would set up their bedrolls slightly apart from the others or take Bill on suspiciously long walks to find a stream.

Pippin in particular seemed green. Boromir had taught him some rudimentary sword skills for a couple of weeks now, but it’s not as if the hobbit had actually used them in combat. It reminded Boromir of the first time he had taken a teenage Faramir to ride out beyond Minas Tirith for a routine patrol, of how wide his eyes were and how he’d seized up at the slightest sign of danger on the horizon. It'd taken weeks for his younger brother to get comfortable out there.

Boromir fought past Gimli to make his way up to the hobbits and investigate the cry. The dwarf was plunging fiercely forward, though the snow now approached his knees.

“Caradhras gives us no warm welcome,” Gimli grumbled as Boromir passed around.

Soon he could see Merry and Pippin marching along in front of him. They wore dour expressions, but otherwise appeared normal.

Merry saw him first. “Boromir!” he yelled over the wind.

“I heard a cry from behind,” Boromir said, now standing between the two.

“Pippin was yelling about his feet. It’s his style to be a bit overdramatic,” Merry said.

Pippin looked up, his face crimson with cold. “They’re blocks of ice! I swear, you could chip me apart like stone.”

“Yes, we’re all going numb, but I don’t have to scream it out so loud they can hear us in Michel Delving!”

“You can’t feel your feet?” Boromir asked. He furrowed his brow, knowing the risk of frostbite. It was becoming clear to him that the hobbits weren’t made for these climes. Like a plant native to a single swath of forest, replant it elsewhere and it would die.

“Bless me, soon we’ll be just as frozen as Bilbo’s trolls!” Pippin cried gloomily, falling fully into self-pity.

Boromir felt annoyance at the so-called ranger surge through his limbs. “Continuing on at this point is folly. I must make them see.”

“No, Boromir. We’ll keep going on. The Fellowship can’t turn back on our account,” Merry yelled.

The man looked down at Pippin. The shivering hobbit nodded in agreement, though his look was glum. Frozen strands of curly ginger hair poked out from his cloak.

“Merry’s right, for once,” Pippin eventually said. “I’ll survive. Besides, I’ll be shaming The Shire if I show hobbits can’t go as far as silly elves, or somber men.”

He then kept on, not making conversation of any kind. But despite his claim, Pippin soon lagged worryingly behind.

***

Finally, they saw reason and stopped. It only took the hobbits’ near-deaths to get Aragorn to agree. Eventually the ranger’s face fell as he realized that his plan to make it to the pass was now impossible.

Everyone minus Legolas and the wizard huddled close as their firewood burned away far too quickly for their liking. The special elf-draught that Gandalf served them gave some semblance of warmth overnight. To Pippin’s great surprise, the snow that he thought had set out to kill him ceased by morning. Yet the four hobbits were still shivering cold, pulling their cloaks tight and staying at the center of the group, as if the deep drifts of snow might take flight and bury them. Pippin’s thoughts flashed between the misery of cold and keeping himself upright.

“Cahadras has not forgiven us…” Gimli started. The rest of the group agreed—they had to go back down the mountain, even though the snow had hidden their trail. A wall of white stood between the Fellowship and the path they had so recently trod.

Pippin was jarred back into the present when he heard Aragorn and Boromir exchanging sharp words. They circled each other haughtily, as if they were tomcats who’d just crossed paths in an alleyway.

“There’s no time to waste, now. This foolish trek through the blizzard has cost us enough,” Boromir said, waving towards the hobbits.

“We had to try the most sensible route first,” Aragorn said. “To do otherwise would be folly as well.”

“And now we are trapped in a flood of snow, and have to force our way out.”

“Of which the tall among us are more than capable, are we not?” Aragorn said slyly.

“If you mean we have no choice, you are correct.” Boromir cast his face, serious as stone, down the mountain. “It’s not wise to tire out your men, after you have just stranded them in a storm.”

“Yet the quicker we go, the less time we waste getting tired,” Aragorn teased. “Leaving now, we could return to the path by midday.”

Boromir straightened his broad shoulders, as if to shame Aragorn’s slenderness. Pippin hadn’t seen that proud look in many long days, since he had successfully defended against one of Boromir’s clever swipes during sword practice.

“If I am a man of Gondor, then we’ll be back in half the time you say.” He marched into the snow and began plowing a way out.

“I’ll be right behind you,” Aragorn said, spring into action.

“If it’s one thing we know living so close to Mordor, it’s how to survive,” Boromir added, heaving a mass of snow away with a grunt. “Nothing living up in some pretty forest could prepare you for.”

“Perhaps my many decades of travel through Middle Earth has just been by dumb luck.”

“Perhaps you have lived for too many decades and are starting to forget things.” Their digging became deeper and more ferocious with each insult they swapped.

Pippin heard the two men bickering long after they disappeared into their path through the snow. At some point Legolas followed, skipping lightly across the banks as if weightless. Aragorn and Boromir soon reappeared, red and puffing and worn. The task had been done. Without a word, they carried the hobbits back to where the snow was merely a white dusting, glittering and benign.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the chapter "The Ring Goes South." I always imagined the snow digging being a sort-of Men of Gondor dick-measuring contest.


End file.
